The Qi March to Shuozhou (553)

The Qi March to Shuozhou was a campaign of the Northern Qi emperor Wenxuan. He took in the Rouran who had fled from the Göktürks and pursued the Göktürks as far as Shuozhou.^[1] The campaign belongs to the end of the Göktürk–Rouran Wars. The annals of the Qi record it.^[1]

Background

After the defeat of 552, part of the Rouran house went south to the Qi. They were Anagui’s heir Anluochen, Anagui’s cousin Dengzhu and Dengzhu’s son Kuti.^[1] The Rouran who stayed in the steppe set up Dengzhu’s second son, Tiefa, as their ruler.^[1] In the second month of 553 the Qi sent Dengzhu and Kuti back north.^[1] Within months the Khitan killed Tiefa, and Dengzhu’s own chief Afuti killed Dengzhu. The people then set up Kuti.^[1] In the same year the Göktürk khan Issik broke the Rouran under Dengshuzi at Mount Mulai.^[2]

The campaign

In the twelfth month of 553 the Göktürks attacked the Rouran again, and the whole people fled south.^[1] The twelfth month of that Chinese year fell at the turn of 553 and 554. Wenxuan marched north from Jinyang. He meant to meet the Göktürks and take the fugitives in.^[1] He deposed Kuti and set up Anluochen as ruler of the Rouran.^[1] He settled them on the Mayi river and gave them grain and silk.^[1] Then he pursued the Göktürks as far as Shuozhou.^[1] According to the annals, the Göktürks asked to submit there. The emperor allowed it and turned back.^[1]

The Qi account

The submission at Shuozhou comes from the Qi court’s own account of its own campaign. No Göktürk or Zhou source confirms it. The annals name no Göktürk leader and report no numbers and no fighting.^[1] They do record Göktürk envoys with tribute at the Qi court in the eighth month of 554 and again in the fourth month of 555.^[1]

Some scholars find in the notice a smaller group than Mukan’s people. No leader is named, and Mukan’s own envoys came to the Qi court in those months.^[3] The same scholars understand the Göktürks’ request to submit as a request for a place inside Qi land.^[4] The Qi army drove them back. Afterwards they were allowed to settle nearer the centre than the place they had been driven from, and tribute followed.^[5] The Rouran, whom the Qi protected, received a ruler of the Qi’s choosing and the allowance of a Qi official. The Göktürks received neither.^[5] In their view, the tribute was the price of the land, and it held only as long as the Göktürk arms did.^[6]

Aftermath

The Rouran under the Qi did not keep the emperor’s favour for long. In the third month of 554 Anluochen revolted, and the emperor defeated him. In the fourth month the emperor took Anluochen’s wife and children, together with more than thirty thousand people.^[1] In the steppe Mukan, Issik’s successor, destroyed the last Rouran under Dengshuzi, in Mukan’s destruction of Dengshuzi.^[2] In the summer of 555 the Qi caught the Rouran who remained at Huaishuo and at Woye.^[1] The fugitives whom Wenxuan took in at the end of 553 were his subjects within a year and his prisoners within two.